Members of the Obama administration do not care whether Catholics and those of other faiths are angry about the ObamaCare mandate regarding contraception, sterilization, and abortion-inducing drugs. It’s quite possible that, like exhibitionists, the White House enjoys the shock value that accompanies all their edicts and executive orders to people of main-street America. Waiting for average Americans to recover from the shock gives them a window of time to amuse themselves at the reaction as they also develop their talking points and spin. But, this year, they have an election to win.

To appease those they view as rigid, conservative Catholics, the administration’s talking points are that they’ll “work it out” with them, give them a year to “adapt” their consciences to engaging in behavior that is against their values, and, perhaps, the favorite means of the White House to ensure a minimum of voter loss: hand out a waiver.

But, exactly what should be “worked out?” “Adapt” to what? A “waiver” from what? All of this talk of flexibility is helping the White House to muddy up the real issue.

The spin by the White House, in the midst of this constitutional crisis, is simply a variant on its age- old theme that healthcare is an unalienable right that the government must give to people. Remember that, in liberalism, unalienable rights come from the government, not from the Creator. With the contraception, etc. mandate, the administration just tweaked the message a bit- made it a bit “pinker,” dare we say: that all women deserve access to free contraception- including Catholic women. How could we leave Catholic women out? After all, that would be discriminatory, right? Wrong.

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Time, experience, and maturity have led me to conclude that it is better to be in control of your own destiny than to have it dictated to you.  If you control your own destiny, then you reap the rewards of your hard work and of your mistakes.

But what if you are afraid to control your own destiny?  What if you have such low self-confidence that you believe it isn’t worth it to even try, that a Steve Jobs is the exception rather than the rule?

The Creation of The Liberal

Think about the people you know who have low self-esteem.  We’ll call that person The Patient. The Patient does not see value in himself.  He does not consider himself worthy of advancement, of self-transcendence, or self-actualization.  Instead, The Patient believes he is a bad person, undeserving of success, love, wealth, or happiness.  He comes to believe, therefore, that any effort he exerts on his own behalf is doomed to fail because he is such a bad person and does not deserve any success.

But there is this tiny little voice — the ego — that just won’t stand for this self-flagellation.  So the ego projects The Patient’s self-hate onto The Other as a defense mechanism.  They project the self-hate onto the person who is happy, wealthy, successful, and loved.  Now, it is The Other who becomes the object of hate.  “Why should he have everything?  What has he done to deserve all this?  I’m not the bad person, he is.”   As a friend’s Facebook quote said just today, “Haters don’t really hate you, they hate themselves because you are a reflection of what they wish to be.” (more…)

The upheavals of the sixties had political and cultural contexts – the war in Vietnam and the Civil Rights movement. There is a great debate about the relationship between culture and politics; a which-came-first conundrum similar to the vexed “chicken or the egg” question. Few deny the critically important relationship between culture and political change. What the sixties generation had however we in the American Renewal movement haven’t got – a soundtrack.

There seems little doubt that the growing bitter rhetoric of American politics signifies a deep national divide. With the centrist middle ground shrunk and ignored, the language of conflict and war is heard more often now than in recent memory in political debate.

The deep relationship between music and politics that was seen during the 1960s was both reactive and causative; culture drives politics and vice versa. Because music plays a far more important role in the lives of young Americans than it has for any preceding generation the power of music to drive change and respond to it both positively and critically should not be neglected. The message is the medium.

A wealth manager, appropriately enough, once told me that when it came to life, information came in three categories:  What you know, what you don’t know, and what you don’t know that you don’t know.  It is the last category that is the most dangerous.

In following David Mamet’s public journey towards an alteration of his political philosophy, I recalled my own transformation.  How was it that I was a die-hard Liberal Democrat until the mid-1990’s, spent a decade in political exile, before emerging with an “Indepentarian” philosophy?

I realized it was because I started using my mind, in the manner a high school math teacher had taught me.  I used reason.

Join me as I go back in time and recount my journey.

1984

I went to a high school where the population was decidedly Liberal.  Consequently, upon arriving at Cornell University, I expected to find the same.  For the most part, I wasn’t disappointed.  Still, I found myself in the presence of a far greater number of Conservatives than I’d ever encountered before and, even worse, they were my intellectual superiors.  With the opportunity to vote in my first Presidential election approaching, and a palpable hatred for Reagan, I eagerly sought out discussion with other like-minded individuals (notice how I only sought the echo chamber).  When confronted with the boisterous Texans down the hall, who challenged my every assertion, I quickly turned away.

“Dave,” I asked the the short, nebbishy kid who lived in the adjacent dorm room, “you don’t believe any of that garbage, do you?”  I was totally confident that Dave would be an ally.

Wrong.  Dave was one of them.

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In honor of the Fourth of July holiday, Broadside Books hosted an on-line symposium asking the question, “Where and How Should Conservatives Attack Liberalism Next?” An excerpt of my answer follows:

The famous philosopher Pogo once observed, “We have met the enemy and he is us.” Reviewing the greatest threat to liberty today, I offer a corollary; “We have met the enemy and we are paying for him.” Our liberty is challenged not so much by political forces as institutional ones. Until we begin dismantling the racket that is Public Sector, Inc., we will never again enjoy the liberties and freedoms our grandparents took for granted.

The current budget crisis has shined a light on the out-sized pay and benefits earned by public sector employees in state and local government. The traditional implicit bargain where government workers accepted slightly lower pay in exchange for job security and decent benefits has been up-ended, with government workers now enjoying high pay and platinum benefits in addition to life-time employment.

The showdowns in Wisconsin, Ohio, New Jersey and other states have shown how difficult it will be to reverse course on this. But even getting public sector pay and benefits back to historic averages is just the tip of the iceberg, or, rather, treatment of a minor symptom of a virulent disease. Balancing government employee pay with resources is a fiscal challenge; balancing our liberties against ever-expanding government is a herculean fight against a massive institutional infrastructure.

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This is a subject I’ve taken a few days to look into. It interested me for a couple of reasons: To highlight the president as a national leader; and, to show how they articulate and carry out their political values. For this I chose Presidents Lyndon Johnson and Ronald Reagan. Johnson because he reinforced the Roosevelt paradigm and cemented modern liberalism with the “Great Society” program. Reagan, because he led a reactionary conservative revolution against that paradigm. A revolution in the making since the time of Johnson. This isn’t to offer any critiques but is more along the lines of presenting history and appreciating the times, differences, and evolution of our nation’s politics, leaders, and ideology. And it certainly isn’t an all encompassing, exhaustive piece of analysis. I didn’t intend for it be.

Presidents differ greatly in their views on the proper role of government. Lyndon Johnson had a strong liberal ideology when it came to domestic affairs. He believed government was legally bound and obligated to take care of the disadvantaged and protect the welfare of society. In his inaugural speech, Johnson laid out his vision by using the words justice and injustice as code words for equality and inequality. Those words were used six times in his speech. The word freedom was used only once. It is here that he was articulating his goal for a “just” America. His “Great Society.”
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Because of the overwhelmingly positive response to my initial manifesto from my fellow Liberals, I’ve decided to expand it.  In addition, it appears my first article was mistaken for satire of some kind.  I can assure readers I am quite serious.  I am a reborn Liberal and these are my solutions for fixing everything.

Global Warming

The science is settled.  Mankind is indeed killing itself, just as I knew would happen when I voted for Mondale in 1984.  Admittedly, I thought the apocalypse would result from a nuclear war back then.  I was close.  Things would indeed get really hot, but strictly from greenhouse gas emissions, not from thousands of nukes going off all at once.  According to the totally balanced summary provided by Wikipedia, carbon dioxide causes 9% – 26% of the greenhouse effect.  The way I see it, if we can wipe out just this portion of the greenhouse emissions alone, we can make a serious dent in the warming trend.

Now, follow me on this next part — every time a human being exhales, he emits carbon dioxide.

The solution is obvious — we need to mandate less exhaling.  So, five times a day, every day, at the exact same time that Muslims stop for their prayers, everyone around the world should hold their breath for a good 90 seconds or so.  If you own a corporation, you have to hold your breath twice as long.   I think even Conservatives will get on board with this because it gives lip service to that whole personal responsibility garbage they buy into.

Additionally, it appears that methane accounts for 4% – 9% of greenhouse emissions.   The solution here is so simple I’m shocked that my fellow global warming alarmists have not figured it out already.

We need less farting.

I know everyone’s primary concern is about diet, but nobody has to give up beans. The farmers shouldn’t suffer just because people need to toot less.  We can have the USDA issue “fanny corks” to every American, free of charge.  Enforcement is easy.  The TSA already has experience inspecting private areas, so Janet Napolitano can just issue a decree expanding their powers.  It will also help with job growth, because we’ll need an army of TSA employees to check fanny corks, particularly in heavily populated urban areas.

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Earlier this month three judges sat down from 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to hash out the constitutionality of Obama’s heath care plan. The panel was in response to two lawsuits filed by Virginia’s Attorney General Kenneth Cuccinelli and Liberty University. Now it seems this is just as much as a political question than constitutional one. The judges were pulled from a pool of 14 candidates. The three judges selected could be decidedly in favor of Obama’s politics. That is because all three judges were Democratic appointees.

This is how they were “pulled.”

Under the rules of the 4th Circuit, judges are picked to sit on particular cases by “a computer program designed to achieve total random selection,” the court said. The third member of the panel, Judge Diana Motz of Maryland, is a President Clinton appointee.

Even if this comes off as a setback to those who find the law it’s very likely the appeals will wind up at the steps of the Supreme Court.

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It’s official.  I have returned to my Liberal roots, and have chosen to embrace Liberalism as I did from birth until 1994.  It makes no sense to fight the tsunami of government anymore, and the truth is, Liberals have had it right all along.  I was completely brainwashed by right-wing talking points, and during a session with my masseuse, she opened up some chakras that wiped my mind clear.

No longer having a mind, I’m putting my intellect to work on making Liberal policies work with maximum impact.  I hope Big Government readers can forgive me.  Your close-mindedness and hate speech cannot hold a candle to doing what is right.

Healthcare

As a Resurrected Liberal, I strongly endorse government intervention to protect people, primarily from themselves.  People have shown they are not capable of personal responsibility or making good choices.  They eat too much.  They drink too much.  They are too stupid to know who the best candidate is.   Therefore, I endorse a Universal Health Care option that, among other things, will tackle several epidemics in our country.

Obesity, for example, is running rampant.  The First Lady has made it her project to get people to eat healthy and trim down.  The problem is that a lot of people just won’t listen, and they are going to eat bad food no matter what they get told, and no matter how often they get the USDA Food Pyramid shoved in their face.

I propose a tax be instituted on all people who exceed their ideal body weight, as determined by the Department of Health.   The tax should really hit fat people hard, because once their pocketbook lightens, they will, too.  I suggest a $1000 tax per pound per year per person.  When they visit their doctor for their free health care, the doctor will record their weight on a standardized scale that a government factory will produce, populated with unionized government employees at a flat salary of $90,000 per year, plus a pension that will have contributions made on their behalf as part of their employment.

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Former Governor of Massachusetts Mitt Romney announced on April 11 that he is “formally exploring a presidential bid”. As such, because a 2012 Romney run would be a repetition of his 2008 attempt at presidential power, a look back is reasonable due diligence for every voter.

When Michael Dukakis, another Governor of Massachusetts, ran for the great office in 1988 there were many who considered him a serious contender. After all, he had the much-touted but highly questionable “Massachusetts Miracle” claim of economic prosperity in that state during the mid to later parts of that decade to bolster his profile. Many voters in Massachusetts were skeptical (Dukakis carried his home state, but few others).

George Bush appeared a lackluster candidate in comparison and almost “too easy” to beat it seemed at the time. But there were ghosts that haunted Mr. Dukakis. As the Democratic candidate seemed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory and Mr. Bush became “Bush #1” it was clear that, for Mr. Dukakis’ campaign, the man and the hour had certainly not met.

Analysts and voters during the 1988 election cycle found at least three negatives about Mr. Dukakis that he could not overcome – and which seemed to unavoidably bring him to defeat. The first was his bizarrely cold and politician-like answer during the second presidential debate to moderator Bernard Shaw’s question: “Governor, if Kitty Dukakis were raped and murdered, would you favor an irrevocable death penalty for the killer?”

Dukakis’ spiritless, calculating, politician-like answer stunned the nation. “No, I don’t, and I think you know that I’ve opposed the death penalty during all of my life.” This unfortunate, but honest, answer essentially ended the debates. Dukakis lost.

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George Will in today’s Washington Post:

By the time Huntington’s book appeared, American had had four of what he called “periods of creedal passion” – the Revolutionary era (1770s), the Jacksonian era (the 1830s), the Progressive era (1900-20) and the 1960s. We are now in the fifth.

The American Creed’s values are liberal, as that term was understood until liberalism succumbed to 20th-century statism. The values, expressing the 18th century’s preoccupation with defending liberty against government, are, Huntington said, “individualistic, democratic, egalitarian, and hence basically anti-government and anti-authority.” The various values “unite in imposing limits on power and on the institutions of government. The essence of constitutionalism is the restraint of governmental power through fundamental law.”

What made the American Revolution a novel event was that Americans did not declare independence because their religion, ethnicity, language or culture made them incompatible with the British. Rather, it was a political act based on explicit principles. So in America more than in Europe, nationalism is, Huntington said, “intellectualized”: “We hold these truths to be self-evident.” Who holds them? Americans. Who are Americans? Those who hold those truths to be self-evident.

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There is no proof yet that Christianne Amanpour is a child molester. Let that sink in for a second. Outrageous, right? Especially when simply said out of the blue like that. Yet that is how the media is treating the insanity of the left-wing progressive charge that conservatives, Sarah Palin and the Tea Party are somehow responsible for the actions of a man who had been obsessed with his target since 2007, more than two years before the Tea Party was in existence.

Amanpour, on her low-rated “This Week” program on ABC, said the following in her report of the tragic act of insanity in Arizona when a disturbed gunman open fire, killed six and wounded more than a dozen, including Congresswoman Gabby Giffords. “…But in fact the suspect in custody, 22 year old Jared Loughner, has no known ties to the tea party or any conservative group.”

It was an unprovoked, out of context slam at a group of people who had nothing to do with anything involving this act of barbarism. But it was exactly what most progressive leftists want the story to be – “forget the tragedy, forget the victims, we have to try to use this to our political advantage and blame conservatives.” After all, never let a crisis go to waste, right?

Most old media left-wing attack dog types are only implying it, but some are flat-out saying it. For example, Paul Krugman, about whom there is also no evidence of child molestation yet, blogged that while there wasn’t “yet” any proof, “…it’s long past time for the GOP’s leaders to take a stand against the hate-mongers.” Implicitly this means that the Democrat party is free to not take a stand against anyone using any inflammatory rhetoric because they don’t do that. Makes you wonder if Mr. Krugman has ever heard of Alan Grayson, MSNBC or many of President Obama’s own remarks.

Media Matters for America Senior Fellow (in what can only be described as watching television and complaining about it) Eric Boehlert, about whom there is ten times the evidence of being a child molester than conservatives are responsible for the shooting of Congresswoman Giffords (in case Eric can’t do math, when you multiply by zero you get zero) could not resist the urge to run to Twitter to blame the right, even though his employer managed to. (As of 3:00 am Media Matters website had no mention of the tragedy.) He took the opportunity to attack Andrew Breitbart and Sarah Palin, falling in line with all the other progressive bomb-throwers who seemingly received “Tweeting points” from a central command.  In his rage, which is pretty much a typical day for Mr. Boehlert, he forgot to do one things…condemn the act or offer any condolences or prayers for the victims whatsoever. In fact, he only wrote one tweet with the name Giffords in it, the others that mention her were retweets.

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Liberals, progressives, socialists, statists, communists — all enemies of civilization argue all issues on the basis of moral relativism, one odious derivation of which is multiculturalism.  There are many arguments for why such principles are wrong.  But perhaps the most obvious problem with moral relativism and its counterparts is that from which moral relativism springs: the idea that there is no objective truth.

If there is no objective truth as the Sophists argue, then how can the statement that there is no objective truth be true?  If nothing is true, then how can the assumption be made that it is true that there is no such thing that is truly inherently good or inherently bad, or that it is true that there is no culture that is truly better than any other culture?  To argue in favor of moral relativism or multiculturalism requires a belief that there is objective truth; this is a conundrum that Leftists cannot argue away.

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One pen stroke from Arizona Governor Jan Brewer has given her state a no-nonsense immigration policy and given America yet another opportunity to see the full face of leftist hypocrisy.

First some key points of the policy-

As shown in the picture above (featuring MSNBC’s poster child of intelligence, Contessa Brewer) this bill essentially says illegal means illegal.  If you are in the state of Arizona illegally you are guilty of trespassing (page 2 line 44), and if you are caught trespassing you will be transferred immediately to the custody of the ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement).  I will address the profiling allegations later.

This bill has teeth, and it puts the screws to employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants (page 6 line 7).  The burden of proof of work eligibility is now on the employer since this bill officially makes it illegal for an undocumented alien to “apply for work, solicit work in a public place, or perform work as an employee or independent contractor in this state.”

Complaints can now be filed with the Attorney General of Arizona or with a county attorney when a business is suspected of employing illegal aliens.  After an investigation, if a business is found to be employing illegal workers charges are brought upon the business, and expedited court status is given to the case.

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At a time when the American taxpayer is on the hook for trillions in current and future federal spending—when the Congressional Budget Office warns that the current rate of federal spending is “unsustainable”—liberal Democrats in Congress have earmarked over $68 million of taxpayer dollars for a Boston shrine to the late Senator Edward Kennedy.

In a detailed report, the Boston Herald describes the planned Edward M. Kennedy Institute as a “temple for Ted Kennedy built with pork.”

According to their account, congressional Democrats—especially Massachusetts senators John Kerry and Edward Markey—have been cramming earmarks for the project into various government funding bills. The Herald found that Kerry and Markey even intend to siphon $28.9 million of the institute’s funding from the Defense Department budget, with almost $19 million of that amount already signed into law.

Why do they think taxpayers should be paying for this shrine? A statement from a Kerry spokesman declared that the institute will bring “knowledge and good citizenship to thousands of young people.”

This has raised the ire of taxpayer watchdog groups. “If the Kennedy family wants to honor the senator, they should find a way to fund it themselves,” David E. Williams of Citizens Against Government Waste told the newspaper. Steve Ellis of Taxpayers for Common Sense agreed that “this could be independently funded and doesn’t need to be getting taxpayer dollars.”

Indeed.

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“Conservatism is America’s longest-dying political movement” claims R. Emmett Tyrrell in his newest book “After The Hangover: The Conservatives’ Road To Victory.” Yet, says the old warrior, it is also poised and fated to ultimately win the culture war.

As one would expect from the one and only RET, it’s quite a read.

He details the obituaries: the 1950s (when the movement was just coming together), 1964. 1974, 1992, 2006, and 2008. As long as conservatism has been growing, it has repeatedly been pronounced dead. Next he notes that just before 2006 it was the Liberals who were having obituaries written for them–in 1994, 2000, and 2004—a little noted fact.

But, as Bob quotes from the longshoreman philosopher Eric Hoffer, “every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.” By the Bush years the pols were spending wildly and giving only lip service to true conservative principles. Some conservative media darlings were too often merely opportunists, mouthing our principles whilst looking for the next lucrative gig.

In its’ infancy, “conservatism” was but a small group of erudite and engaging intellectuals with a beef. It was far from a racket. It was a great cause focused squarely on limited government and personal liberty. Always this cause has been up against the statists, the so-called liberals (who are not, in fact, very liberal at all). So Tyrrell designates them Liberals–large L. And because said Liberals dominate our media and political culture, they have been in a great position to publicly declare our doom.

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In my other life, I’m a food writer for The Boston Herald – a cultural raisin in the sun in the far-left world of food journalism here in the People’s Republic of Massachusetts.

Voltaire

So I was shocked, during a dinner the other night with a bunch of folks in the biz, when one local restaurant critic declared that he had “a very illiberal” view of abortion: he was pro-life! Several table-mates nearly spit up their merlot and brie.

I stood by his side, but not by his phraseology. “It’s a liberal view if you’re the baby,” I said, making my point but not many friends in the process.

The incident highlighted an issue that’s been eating at me for quite some time: the misuse of the word “liberal” in the current political lexicon.

As you know, the American cultural divide is defined by two terms: on the right we have “conservatives” and on the left we have “liberals.”

There’s only one problem: the leftists are anything but “liberal.” In fact, I stopped using the term “liberal” to describe leftists quite some time ago. I call them what they are: “leftists,” i.e., people who espouse weakness in the face of dictators overseas and favor a dictatorial big-government doctrine here at home.

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Big Government would not exist were it not given sanction by the people.  Those who continue to support it have been duped in large part as a direct or indirect result of the ideological subversion of our academic institutions.  The leaders in all fields of our society were raised in the politically correct, militantly liberal academy, and so it is only natural that the influence of socialist ideas has infected every aspect of our culture.  In so doing, academia has produced leaders that undermine our society rather than helping it to flourish.

It is evident that educational institutions are turning society on its head when we see the kinds of leaders they herald as the shining examples for our students to follow.  On May 17th of this year, the graduating students of Columbia University will spend their morning listening to their Class Day speaker, Benjamin Jealous.  Readers may recall that Mr. Jealous penned a piece for the Huffington Post in which he ardently defended and praised Van Jones, calling him “an American treasure.”  He is being called on to speak because he is a star in the social justice movement.

For as Columbia’s Dean puts it, “Columbia’s undergraduate experience is built on the idea that our college must not only help students develop their capacities for critical thinking, but also nurture in them the responsibilities of citizenship in a democratic society. Benjamin Todd Jealous wonderfully personifies the value that Columbians have long placed on active engagement in the world and in finding the solutions to society’s challenges.”  Jealous does so by leading what he refers to as “a volunteer army for social change” in the NAACP.  That he would describe the organization in such a light should come as no surprise as Jealous is a former New York community organizer and AFL-CIO spokesman.

Mr. Jealous’ address to my class will mark a fitting end to my four years at Columbia in which I witnessed the attack on members of the Minutemen, the speech of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a professor pushing for students to join the peace corps in the middle of his science class and Israeli Apartheid Week amongst innumerable other travesties.

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With this vote, the U.S. House has chosen big government over freedom; bureaucracy over people.

The American Conservative Union has opposed this bill from the start because of its massive cost and red tape. The more we learn and Americans learn about the devil in the details of this bill the more disgust among Americans will grow. Empowering IRS agents to determine if Americans have proper health care coverage is not health care reform. Raising taxes is not health care reform. Massive increases in government spending is not health care reform. Imposing fines on Americans who don’t toe the line with what the liberals want in their personal health care plans is not real health care reform.

History will indeed mark this moment – as some Americans become more dependent on government and government becomes more intrusive in the personal lives and financial decisions of its citizens. This is a moment when government growth took a giant leap toward swallowing up more and more of the hard earn money of Americans. This is a moment when common sense reform took a back seat to liberalism run amuck.

In responding to the Democrat’s claims that spending massive amounts of new money on a new government program would actually lower the deficit, the ACU notes that the Ways and Means Committee estimated Medicare would cost only $9 billion each year after 25 years but that on its 25th birthday Medicare spent $67 billion, or seven times the initial cost estimate. The pattern is consistent in federal spending and the massive health care bill’s cost will likely follow suit.

The American people are not stupid or naive.

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